Now and again I’ll introduce a new colour into my palette to keep things fresh. Here, I introduced Pale Olive Green – a lovely rich, light green. This quick landscape painting of Charles Town in Cornwall illustrates how expressive, blocky marks complement fine detailing in the buildings.

1. Using a light violet base, I roughly sketched an outline of the scene.

Magenta was the first colour applied to the foreground – this gives me something to play off the forthcoming greens, which included Sap, Phthalo, Pale Olive and combinations of Cadmium Yellow and Coeruleum Blue. No white is added at this stage so that the colour remains rich. Yellow Ochre, the aforementioned greens and soft shots of Deep Violet were used for the shaded areas of the houses. The general idea at this stage is to achieve a full coverage, using (hopefully) interesting marks and streaks of colour.

2. Titanium White, Coeruleum Blue, Process Cyan and Yellow Ochre are mixed to create a blue grey for the clouds.

I also added subtle tints of Deep Violet into the grey to break up the blues. Varying twists and turns of the brush added movement to the cloud formations.

3. Once most of the canvas had been covered, I began to apply strong lights in Titanium White, Process Cyan and Cadmium Yellow.

The purest highlights are always reserved for the final stages. Again my marks at this stage were quite expressive as this is my preference: too much refi ning and the painting would begin to mimic a photo.

4. At this stage, smaller marks helped define the trees and a lighter, richer application of greens enhanced the fields, too.

I have even included a touch of splatter to add interest to the marks.

5. All that was left were the details in the buildings and the odd refinement.

Working over the entire painting at once helps maintain a consistency to the finish.﻿